For first time, men join Chicago YWCA board, Foundation for Women

New diversity for organizations founded with all-women leadership

June 24, 2013|Barbara Brotman

YWCA Metropolitan Chicago board member Ubong Ituen high-fives Ernest Wong after he was introduced Thursday as a new board member at the YWCA's annual meeting, held downtown at the Union League Club of Chicago. (Carolyn Van Houten, Chicago Tribune)

JR Kerr, Juan Carlos Avila and Ernest Wong stood in the line of new board members as they were introduced last week, smiling to acknowledge the applause from YWCA staff, members and supporters.

With that, history was made. Men had joined the board of the YWCA Metropolitan Chicago for the first time in its 136-year history.

It is an unusual sort of barrier-breaking, YWCA Chief Executive Officer Dorri McWhorter said happily, and the men on board are enjoying it.

"It's rare that men get to pioneer anything," she said. "They're excited to be the first men to do anything."

Nicholas Brunick blazed a similar trail last year when he became the first man on the board of the Chicago Foundation for Women. On Wednesday the foundation's board added a second man.

It is a significant departure. These organizations have not only worked for women's welfare, they served as forums for women to exercise leadership. The Chicago Foundation for Women was deliberately founded with an all-woman board.

But that was in 1985. Now, "It's time," said Sunny Fischer, executive director of the Richard H. Driehaus Foundation, who was one of the founders of the Foundation for Women. "I think now women believe that men need to be involved in these conversations about how to improve the quality of life for everyone."

"It's not (saying), 'Well, we couldn't do it, so we need you now,' " said K. Sujata, president and CEO of the Foundation for Women. "It's the other way around: 'We've laid the groundwork, we've built our strength and now you can join your voice to ours.' "

"For us, it's really been about practicing what we preach around inclusion," McWhorter said. "But, too, it was really about getting great people (and getting) the talent we need to deal with complex issues."

Both groups' boards brim with accomplished women. The four men joining the YWCA board — one was not present at the annual meeting — will serve alongside 40 women, including Joycelyn Winnecke, Tribune vice president and associate editor, who is secretary of the board.

But men can bring insight into reaches of corporate and cultural worlds that remain male-dominated, McWhorter said. Their business experience, professional connections, personal networks and financial resources — all are of great value to nonprofit groups.

Kerr, curator of Frequency540, a branding and marketing company, has taken a little good-natured ribbing. "They said, 'I didn't know they let guys on the board of the YWCA,' " he said. "Then they said, 'I didn't know they let guys like you on the board of the YWCA.' "

But a guy like him is particularly interested in the YWCA's work in supporting women and girls.

"I have three daughters," he said. "So I decided that my daughter would have every opportunity, every permission, that a young man would have."

When he took 7-year-old Claire along to tape interviews of YWCA executives that were shown at the annual meeting, she told him she didn't know women were allowed to be in charge of organizations.

She knows now.

"I have three daughters; I have a very strong, professional Latina wife," said Avila, managing partner of Toroso Investments.

When their youngest daughter was born, he said, his wife gave him the book "Strong Fathers, Strong Daughters," about the importance of fathers in young women's lives. He found it so meaningful that he has given away more than 40 copies to other fathers.

He wants his daughters to grow up to be strong, competent women. "If they are able to do that, they can do anything," he said.

"I have two boys," said Wong, principal and president of Site Design Group Ltd. and a longtime supporter of the YWCA whose mother once served on its board. "I want to show them how important it is to be able to contribute in places you wouldn't normally be at the table."

"I see a very big chasm between men and women in where they sit on boards as well as where they are in the business world," he said. "I'm very fascinated by Sheryl Sandberg's book, 'Lean In.' She tells men: 'You've got to come to the table on a number of issues, such as raising a family. You'd better participate.'

"There are a lot of things that, as men, we take for granted. I think there are things that we, as men sitting on an all-women's board, can learn. ... And I think we can contribute."

"As men, we can live our own lives in a way that contributes to solutions," wrote Brunick, an attorney and father of three daughters and a son, in a Father's Day message for the Chicago Foundation for Women's online newsletter.

"We can be better sons, husbands and fathers. We can ... put our voice, talent and resources behind organizations that are working to address these issues.

"... And maybe most importantly, we can teach our sons that 'being a man' means treating all people — women and men — with love and respect and as our equals."

Welcome to the table, guys.

It's a big one, befitting the size of the challenges and the number of women and girls struggling to get by. Your efforts and your voices are important and appreciated.

And feel free to ditch the suit and tie occasionally for a T-shirt. The one that declares, "This is what a feminist looks like."